Rand Paul
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Like him a lot. I think he'll give it a shot. The primaries will be tough...too much old guard and media telling Republicans they need a "centrists" in order to win.
he's an interesting guy. appreciate much of what he advocates. he gets fringish on some things which scares some folks. and he isn't a big govt guy which scares almost everyone else.
Your question number 1- He's a pretty boy. Question number 2- Please don't waste my tax dollars. So being as you are a "big fan", then are you saying you would vote for him for president? FCC.
His biggest issue is a lack of experience. He has never run anything other than a doctors office. How will the Republicans defend his resume should he be the nominee after attacking the current president relentlessly for a lack of experience?
I like some of his positions especially on having a smaller military footprint around the globe, however his idea of eliminating the Fed or returning to the gold standard is pure lunacy and is illustrative of why someone with a medical degree shouldn't be making decisions that involve economics.
Watching some of the Sunday talk shows I thought it was sort of funny that Scott Walker is getting all the attention becasue he is ahead in the Iowa poll with 14% but no one is talking about Paul who is in second with 13% - like that 1% is really significant.
I hope he does run becasue I think he adds interesting and in some cases contrarian thinking that will stimulate discussion and debate. The more the issues are debated in the primaries the better for the public IMO.
This post was edited on 2/3 12:49 PM by Deeeefense
I like some of his positions especially on having a smaller military footprint around the globe, however his idea of eliminating the Fed or returning to the gold standard is pure lunacy and is illustrative of why someone with a medical degree shouldn't be making decisions that involve economics.
Watching some of the Sunday talk shows I thought it was sort of funny that Scott Walker is getting all the attention becasue he is ahead in the Iowa poll with 14% but no one is talking about Paul who is in second with 13% - like that 1% is really significant.
I hope he does run becasue I think he adds interesting and in some cases contrarian thinking that will stimulate discussion and debate. The more the issues are debated in the primaries the better for the public IMO.
This post was edited on 2/3 12:49 PM by Deeeefense
His foreign policy history will spell doom for him in the primaries. I do think he could win a general election as long as hes not a third party candidate.
If Paul wants to be taken seriously as a possible Presidential candidate, he should make a run for the Kentucky governor's seat, get elected, get some executive experience, and then run for President somewhere down the road. As it stands now, he's wasting his time.
^^ Because Obama had experience of running something before we elected him two terms.
I see a lot of hate towards Senator Paul, but not many are explaining why.
The days of hardcore conservative republicans winning the presidency are over. Accept it. It is a liberal world and country now and the Huckabees of the republican side are only going to give us Hilary as president. Which would be a total disaster.
This post was edited on 2/3 1:07 PM by ThroughBlue
I see a lot of hate towards Senator Paul, but not many are explaining why.
The days of hardcore conservative republicans winning the presidency are over. Accept it. It is a liberal world and country now and the Huckabees of the republican side are only going to give us Hilary as president. Which would be a total disaster.
This post was edited on 2/3 1:07 PM by ThroughBlue
No...not at all. Obama clearly showed experience is relative.
With that said, I really hope Rand runs and wins the Republican nomination. That would be delicious.
Also, please ban the OP - we have a political thread pinned at the top.
Why anyone would sacrifice the best gig in the world, a seat in the US Senate, just to have a chance to throw ish at the other monkeys in a Republican Presidential primary is beyond me.
And that's exactly what he'll have to do if he's serious about running. See KRS 118.405.
And that's exactly what he'll have to do if he's serious about running. See KRS 118.405.
I like him. He's a libertarian, like his dad. But he'll never get the Republican nomination. I'll vote for whomever is on the Libertarian ticket.
I agree with this. He would get some millennial/libertarian votes for sure.
That said, he'll never make it out of the primary.
He's going to get challenges from Ted Cruz.
They will continually try to out do each other in getting spotlight as they both try to fight for the same piece of the voting pie.
Ted Cruz has created or is in the process to create legislation that will eventually force a vote on repealing Obamacare.
Rand Paul is probably kicking himself for not jumping on that immediately after the November election to roll out as soon as the new Congress stepped in.
Cruz is more palatable and can compete for votes in the Republican circles, Rand will have wider appeal to moderates and Reagan Democrats.
But Rand is going to have to avoid landminds that the media will throw at him , primarily because neither the old guard Republicans or Democrats want to see him get a foothold.
Fox News would treat him differently than say Scott Walker or Jeb Bush.
They will continually try to out do each other in getting spotlight as they both try to fight for the same piece of the voting pie.
Ted Cruz has created or is in the process to create legislation that will eventually force a vote on repealing Obamacare.
Rand Paul is probably kicking himself for not jumping on that immediately after the November election to roll out as soon as the new Congress stepped in.
Cruz is more palatable and can compete for votes in the Republican circles, Rand will have wider appeal to moderates and Reagan Democrats.
But Rand is going to have to avoid landminds that the media will throw at him , primarily because neither the old guard Republicans or Democrats want to see him get a foothold.
Fox News would treat him differently than say Scott Walker or Jeb Bush.
You ever followed a political race before? Democrats start yelling, "you hypocrites thought inexperience was a disqualifier 8 years ago!" Republicans yell back, "you hypocrites thought inexperience was fine 8 years ago!" Continue ad nauseam. In the end few people make their decision based on it.
Executive experience, absolutely not. But I'm not one that thinks a president must have been a governor or something. All in all, Rand Paul will have more experience in a federal elected position than Obama (6 years compared to 4), but less overall elected experience (6 years compared to 12 years). Obama had a background in constitutional law, which matters to some people, matters not to some, and being in law may be seen as a negative to some. Likewise, community involvement and serving on the board of various organizations was seen by many as positive leadership experience, meaningless to some, and a negative by others. Paul has less "relevant" education, but is a small business owner who ran his own medical practice and founded a clinic to serve those who couldn't afford eye surgery. In all, you can probably conclude that Paul is less experienced than Obama, but I would also conclude that I don't know how much that does or will matter in an election.
edit: My take, he's definitely running and will be a major player (among the let's say 3 people who end up serious contenders) in the Republican primary. He'd be a dangerous and unpredictable opponent for the Democratic nominee should he win the primary; he's not your typical Republican and while he might lose some support from some areas, he could challenge for votes from people who might not typically go pull an R lever.
This post was edited on 2/3 4:37 PM by ganner918
TankedCat hit EVERYTHING on the head with that longwinded post. No way I'm reading that.
Can we please stop electing folks who are only running because they are related to another politician? We say we want outsiders, but continuing to elect the offspring/siblings/spouses of other politicians is showing how awful we as a country are at keeping insiders IN office.
George Bush, Hilary, Jeb Bush, Al Gore, Rand Paul, Ben Chandler, Andrew Cuomo, ALL of the Daleys, etc. Hell, Andy Beshear might get elected to something (hope not).
At least he voted for something he believed in. My personal pet peeve is when someone is so blinded by their party lines that they would vote for anyone......as long as it indentifies with their party.
Take Albany for example. If he Hitler was running for the Democratic nomination, Albany would vote for him. Then he'd get on here and tell everyone how great he is and how he was misunderstood with the whole genocide thing back in Germany.
If I get the chance I'll vote for Rand. If not I'll vote for Gary Johnson (assuming he's the libertarian candidate).
I'm waiting to see what happens when libertarian Rand, who says the government should never try to legislate morality in any way, courts the Christian voters. He'll get them because of the R in front of his name but it will make a nice dividing line between ideological voters and hypocites. It worked here to get him in office now, but I want to see what happens on a larger scale.
Rand already breaks from libertarian ideas on abortion, believing in a right to life that begins at conception and seeking an end to abortion. He dances around the issue of marijuana, supporting medical use and reducing criminal penalties for possession, but not legalization. He likewise dances around same sex marriage by simply saying it's a state issue and that the federal government could rework the tax code to where it doesn't pay attention to marriage (which ignores all the other ways marriage matters with respect to the federal government).
Rand saw what speaking plainly about injecting libertarian policy to evangelical republicans did to his father's campaign.
I guarantee his #1 objective is bending just enough to avoid that while trying to hold on to the populism generated by his father (who anyone paying attention is ground zero for the tea party movement)
The Christians are easily duped by the (R)'s. I mean, the Democrat voters are lemmings as well, but the Christians are more easily duped because they try to see the good in everybody, much to their chagrin about 1 year into every Republican presidency. I guarantee there are going to be people who vote R because they think their candidate will overturn Roe v Wade.
He's had one foot in just about every fringe conspiracy theory for years and years. He just can't help himself.
I've found myself agreeing with him......but his dabbling in neo-confederacy, mandatory vaccines could lead to martial law, black helicopter-type stuff will keep him from ever gaining the nomination. He could do some damage in the primary, but Lordy he's an opposition researchers dream.
I've found myself agreeing with him......but his dabbling in neo-confederacy, mandatory vaccines could lead to martial law, black helicopter-type stuff will keep him from ever gaining the nomination. He could do some damage in the primary, but Lordy he's an opposition researchers dream.
his personal property ideas would be a big hurdle to overcome. He'd lose the minority vote if he couldn't address it and clear it up early on.
That said, he's the only candidate that can go to a University like Berkeley and address the crowd on his conservative views and they find common ground with him.
The irony is if R v W was ever overturned there would still be just as many abortions. They would just be more expensive, less safe and you might have to travel longer distances to get one.
I'm all for mitigating abortions but making them illegal would not be effective.
LOL
Let me guess...you probably thought he did an awesome job whitesplaining race issues at Howard University.